Photo Ladies 7/23/23 Photo Ladies 7/23/23

Horsegirl, Iceage, Water From Your Eyes, and Lifeguard @ Central Park SummerStage - NYC

July 20th 2023: Horsegirl, Iceage, Water From Your Eyes, and Lifeguard @ Central Park SummerStage - New York City

Horsegirl - Photos Courtesy of Edwina Hay

On Thursday, July 20, 2023, Horsegirl, Iceage, Water From Your Eyes, and Lifeguard performed at Capital One City Parks Foundation SummerStage at Rumsey Playfield in Central Park. All four acts have one thing in common: they’ve all released music on the same record label that’s based in New York City, Matador Records. The show was free to attend, for all ages, and was one of the highlights of their schedule this season.

Chicago’s Lifeguard, who began their tour with Horsegirl tonight, just released a pair of EPs on Matador Records (Crowd Can Talk EP and Dressed in Trenches EP) and kicked off the show at 6 PM. The young band was full of energy and was a great start to this highly anticipated show.

Water From Your Eyes released their Everyone’s Crushed album at the end of May on Matador, and their set featured songs from that release. The duo of Nate Amos and Rachel Brown were joined by an additional guitarist, Al, and seemed to have many fans in the audience who were eager for their early evening set.

Copenhagen’s Iceage went on next at 7:41 PM, and the last performance of theirs I caught was in 2019 in Queens and Central Park’s outdoor stage seemed to fit them well, with many people near the barricade dancing and singing along during their set. Singer Elias Bender Rønnenfelt barely stood still during their performance. Immediately after “High & Hurt,” Elias declared, “We love you, New York.”

Horsegirl, who I last saw in March opening for Unwound, closed the show when their set began just before 9 PM. The second song of their set was brand new, and Penelope mentioned her brother, Isaac Lowenstein, of Lifeguard, while on stage. Before starting their second brand new song, Horsegirl announced they were recently in their hometown of Chicago working on their second album. During “Billy,” Horsegirl brought out the trio of Lifeguard to assist them on the final song of their set.

Throughout the show, a t-shirt gun was used to launch t-shirts into the audience, and was done by a member of a band who wasn’t performing at that moment. For Lifeguard, Nora of Horsegirl shot a t-shirt to a lucky audience member who was near me, proudly whipping it around in the air after catching it. During Water From Your Eyes, Kai of Lifeguard used the gun, in Horsegirl’s performance, Nate of Water From Your Eyes shot shirts into the audience a few times before the show came to an end. The venue also kept fans cool by having their security team occasionally spray water but simultaneously needed more than just one water fountain/bottle refill station located in a somewhat hidden spot, which was a noticeable change compared to last year. Between the strong bill and venue inside one of our city’s most famous public parks, Thursday night was a stellar way to spend a warm July evening in New York City.

Horsegirl

Lifeguard

Water From Your Eyes

2-Man-who-caught-t-shirt-during-Lifeguard-by-Edwina-Hay-1566.jpg

Iceage

Photo Ladies 8/23/22 Photo Ladies 8/23/22

Pitchfork Presents @ Knockdown Center - Maspeth, NY

August 21st 2022: Pitchfork Presents ft. Big Freedia, Dawn Richard, Billy Woods, Soul Glo, Jane Remover, Mega Bog, Water From Your Eyes, and Katie Alice Greer @ Knockdown Center - Maspeth, NY

Photos and Coverage Courtesy of Edwina Hay

On Sunday, August 21, 2022, the first Pitchfork Presents concert took place at Knockdown Center in Maspeth, NY. The stellar bill featured acts from a wide range of genres performing on indoor and outdoor stages and concluded with two performers from New Orleans, LA: Dawn Richard and Big Freedia.

The show began indoors with Katie Alice Greer (formerly of the Washington, DC punk band Priests), who was accompanied by Forest Juziuk performing songs from her June solo record, Barbarism. This was Greer’s first time performing live on the east coast in three years. Water From Your Eyes was up next on the outdoor stage and performed as a trio. Jared Ashdown also played guitar with Nate Amos and Rachel Brown. Mega Bog was backed by Zack Burba (iji), Aaron Othiem on keys, and Greg Fox (GDFX) on drums.

Jane Remover were up next on the outdoor stage and at one point, their DJ used a GameCube controller, which I can say I have never seen during a live set before. Soul Glo performed my favorite songs from their newest album Diaspora Problems (their debut for Epitaph Records), “Gold Chain Punk (whogonbeatmyass?)” and “Driponomics” and, predictably, a mosh pit broke out up front during their set.

Rapper billy woods was backed by DJ Mo Niklz and remarked that he spent seven hours in a car to return home to NYC for this show. woods performed songs from his new record with Preservation, Aethiopes, along with older material. At one point he joked that the audience at the outdoor stage was for Big Freedia so he would get out of the way soon. He was later joined by his Armand Hammer partner, ELUCID, for a couple of songs.

Dawn Richard was the last performance on the indoor stage and most of the songs she performed came from her Second Line album that was released in 2021. Her set seemed to be an abbreviated version of the Electro Revival show she did at BAM earlier this year and was wonderful again.

Big Freedia closed out the show, accompanied by a group of dancers and a DJ, by beginning with her recent single “Big Diva Energy” and moving on to older material such as “Explode” (which has the lyric “release your wiggle” that was featured by Beyoncé on her latest single, “Break My Soul”). Freedia also performed her remix of “Judas” by Lady Gaga and brought people from the audience on stage for “Azz Everywhere.” Speaking of Beyoncé, Freedia did her part from “Formation” before launching into her song “Play” which features Goldiie. Before Freedia closed her set, a sing-along to “Break My Soul” plus dancing to other songs ended the fantastic show before the 11 PM curfew.